Strategies
Mage and Tanks AND Archers Personally I don't have that much good stuff. I use mostly uncommons, some rares and one or two legendary. I have found that if you make one row of "tanks" with pikemen behind them it slows them down alot. In the meantime you need to have 3+ mages with casting times under 15 seconds. It also helps to make one "Boss" at the front of your army. A good tip is to farm gold for a while and buy 2,660 packs (steel boosters) as they are good for rares and commons (and for same price gives over half the uncommons 7,900 packs do) (7,900 = 5 rares,2,660 = 2 rares: 2,660 + 2,660 + 2,660 = 7,980: 6 rares) Use pikemen and front liners and archers to kill your enemy Karllich started write HERE: If you want some simple strategies: On the last squad give Rhigar mythic(best option)/Any other unit with aodans shield/static orb. Next squad first collumn Humans with Muskets/Lightning bow, on the second collumn humans with Poison bow/Fire bow/Long bow/Living bow, and third collumn humans with Short bow/Fine craft bow. And on the other squads give vermin or cheapest(on points) units you have(like meat shields). If you have, you can add to your lightning archers dry eel belt, To you poison archers rotten mails, poison bottles, To fire archers magma emblem, and to other archers archer gears or archer bracers.You can use any creatures like archers but vermin have very low Hitpoints.Set your archers speed to slow. Organic Helix here with what I'd call: THE SKELETON ENGINE STALL My farming army for SURVIVAL mode consisted of: 2 Ultima staffs (http://battle-cry.wikia.com/wiki/Ultima_Staff) 1 Yasur's staff (http://battle-cry.wikia.com/wiki/Yasur%27s_Staff) 2 Yasur's Ring (http://battle-cry.wikia.com/wiki/Yasur%27s_Ring) And any amount of long range attackers, I usually did staffs due to the large casting speed increase. But it could be effective with a Rhigar Mythic and bowmen. This army is almost completely useless against another casting army unless you can outcast or outlast them, but it can be easily altered to counter any opposing army. The skeletal warriors block most attacks besides the no distance casters. This is a stall tactic. Also often used but strong tactic is so called Shifting Machinegun(dont be confused with that weapon), you have to make 3 collumns of shapeshifters 1 collumn with living bows 2 collumns with broken muskets place them to second wave. To first wave place 1 rhigar mystic and 3 Zammaroth mystics. To third fourth and fifth wave place misform mystics/vermins. Now you can go. Steamed-Up Strategy This is a powerful but expensive strategy. You'll need: 4 Steam Behemoths, 12 Imps, 12 Imp Muskets, 1 Rhigar Mythic, 1 Imp Shield, six deflagration scale OR six Natobaethian Plate(or a combination of the two), and six of your cheapest unit. So you give your six cheapest units deflagration scale/ Natobaethian plate and put them in the front row. Fill the next two squads up with two Steam Behemoths each. On the final row, put six imps with imp muskets at the very back, a Rhigar Mythic with Imp Shield in the middle of the back row, and in front of him six more imps with imp muskets. Finally, set the first three squads to fast. Your good to go. Simply tweak what doesn't work a little, but it should be enough to take out most campaign levels. Tournaments and Ranked Matches BoredMusician here. Because Tournaments and Ranked Matches feature armies made by other players, I'm going to outline a few of the strategies I've seen and used there, and how to bring them down. Note that this is geared towards mid-high level play, and I'm assuming you have built a collection, and at least have a few key mythics. The Three Man Army Typically Three guys (although it could be more, or less, depending). Typically, these strats involve higher powered players, with a number of specific units. Typically you have three guys: The Fodder-Slayer, the Tankbuster, and the Magebreaker. The Fodder-slayer you can Identify right away. The higher end players using this strat almost exclusively use the Ok'Koraz' Hammer , since it has two beautiful effects. One, it gives the slayer +10 DEF on every kill, which plays into its' second effect, which every second hit brings down lightning onto the entire squad facing it, for 15 damage across the squad. Some 3 Man Armies Use two of these bad boys, since they're so damn good. Alternatively, some use 3 Demons or Zamaroth Mythics, and the Zamaroth Sword, or the Azaratius' Axe. Typical Shields used include the Ultra Shield and the Ceriphyrian shield, for Defense and resistances, respectively. Specials can Vary, but typically the Fodder-Slayer will use the King's Necklace of Death. Your fodder-slayer is usually the one you Don't Want To Die, so common Races include the Zamaroth and Angel Mythics, Death, or one of the tankier rares if they don't have the mythics. The Second is the Tankbuster. Some forgo this, in favor of a second Fodder-slayer. Personally, I prefer not to. One fodder-slayer is plenty to clear the field of all those pesky Vermin in-between you and your enemy's pesky archers/mages. Tankbusters vary between builds, but usually they involve one of two things. Either an Archer in a squad behind the Slayer, or a guy with a hammer beside him. High level Tankbusters typically use a Hammer with 2 Square-reach, and a Ring of Madness. Since the guys this guy wants to fight will have higher resistances, he wants to stack HEAVY into one type of attack, to deal ALL the damage. Magebreakers are...Magebreakers. They Exist so that the Stated above Skeleton Engine Stall can't keep your fodderslayers at bay. Depending on what they have trouble with, typical Magebreakers have Anti-magic Fields, Ultra Rings, (since ever-so-slightly lower HP doesn't really matter), Aodan's Shield, and mediocre other things, since they're saving their points for the heavy hitters. Sometimes they even have Anti-Tech crystals and Aodon's shield, to mess with archers, but that's much less common. Counters The trick to beating the Three-man-army is to have strength in Depth. Smaller numbers of archers using high-damage weapons such as Battle Muskets (although high explosive Resist is usually on the stronger ones, so...eh.) or Reigar's Bow and Archer gear is an effective way to get rid of them, if enough fodder is used. (assuming the Koraz' is used in the 3-man, instead of the Demon Strat) Personally, I enjoy using a mage build, using the Octomen, Umenth Mythic and Seaking Staff, along with the Armageddon Staff for the fodder, since the 3 Man Army's biggest weakness is its' lack of ability to effectively tamp down on magic and ranged countermeasures. Also, Ice Resistance is Very Rarely Used on those strategies, so no matter what, you'll be doing damage. If you don't have the mythics, rares etc to combat this strategy using my methods, using Flags en masse to boost a single row of ranged units might give you enough firepower, but...Honestly, this is a hard strategy for newer players to counter, and that's why you see it a lot. Magical Onslaught This is exactly what it sounds like. Lots of fodder, lots of staves, lots of elemental power being thrown around. There are really only two forms to the Magical Onslaught, and they're interchangable, really, depending on what cards you have. One involves the Umenth Mythic, usually more than one, and maybe a few of the rares. The other uses Ultima Staff. They both do basically the same thing. The Ultima Staves are more accessable earlier on, being part of the first pack, but they also give your opponent the magical buff as well, which can lead to some crazy, 2 second matches. The Umenth Mythic, on the other hand, only buffs other Umenths and Octopods. Typical Weapons of the Magical Onslaught include the Armageddon Staff, to wipe entire boards. the Swamp Staff to sweep your fodder, The Koraz staff and the Pyro Staff to take out low HP rows entirely, taking out archers and other mages, and two of my personal favorites, the Seaking Staff, and a combination of Yasur's Staff and Yasur's Ring to mess up 3 man Armies. Variants of this strategy sometimes run Fodder and the Evil Staff to turn an entire squad into cheap demons, who also resist common fire weapons like the Solar Staff. They all boil down to their fancy magic toys. Take those away from them, especially from the Pure Magical Assault, and they're left at the mercy of your ranged weapons or fodder-killing beasts. Thin lines of powerful ranged with Anti-magic gear will mess these armies up, and in the case of the Yasur's Staff builds, they're also vulnerable to their own medicine, the board wiping Armageddon, Solar and other similar staves. Evil Staff builds are especially weak at the very beginning, so aggressive armies with lines of rangers can do some good work against these. Demonic Possession Okay, they're not taking your units, I'm being dramatic. What isn't dramatic is this brutal strategy that punishes fodder-reliant strategies like the Onslaught and the ranged barrage. It's an oldie, but it's seen a comeback, ever since Zamaroth Mythics took off. It's also AMAZING for survival mode. This strategy uses the Zamaroth Sword, a Dark Weapon that has a nasty little magic. It will boost Demon's dark ATK by 2 and deal 2 Damage to all non-demons every 20 seconds, and it also has 10 Dark and Slashing, and 5 Fire ATK. In other words, 2-3 of these things will WRECK most mages, since most armies put their mages in the back, and leave them with a minimum of health to save Army Points. Basically, this strategy will destroy most "Power in Numbers" armies entirely, nuking their board and slicing their weaker "Power" critters to bits. However, it often loses out to Three Man armies. Newer Versions of this Strategy use the aforementioned Zamaroth Mythics, Which boost the dark ATK and DEF of all Demons, and the Shapeshifter or the Misform Mythic, usually both. Essentially, this strategy uses the boosts that the Zamaroth (or the Imra'ilh Mythic, for Holy ATK) which stacks, to make all their ShapeShifters and Misforms have high amounts of DEF and elemental ATK that can pierce resistances and do a ton of damage. Typically loses out to numbers, unless you throw in a Zamaroth Sword or another sweeping magic weapon...But if you're doing that, then use less Shapeshifters and more Demons, since your Misforms and Shapeshifters WILL take damage as well from the Zamaroth Sword. Ranged Superiority Honestly, this is an interesting mechanic, but the first mistake people make, in my opinion, is to put all the weapons they can onto their weaker guys and spam them, 6x3x5. no, no, no. Ranged units are a happy medium between magic and Melee. Typically they have decent damage, better DPS than Melee. they're more reliable than Magic, but less damaging...at least, at first. Ranged units rely on their melee guys to keep the enemy off of them so they can unleash hell. The Thin Line (mix up your weaponry) Like the Medieval Archers in History, archers do best against Fodder when they're in lines, typically two or more deep. Basically, against Fodder, you want to layer your archers by range, so that three lines of high powered muskets won't all hit the same line of Vermin and render all their power moot. At the back, I like the Mythic Bow, but in the middle range, it's up to you. Less is more, with Archers, and usually you want them to be hitting your opponent's strong/pesky units. If you can't or won't layer them by range to maximize their fodder-killing prowess, you want to get some mages or an Ok'Koraz Hammer for the Vermin fodder. The Column (Sniping the 3 Man army) This is actually an Offshoot of the 3 Man army, utilizing Archers in a single-file Line, and a single, powerful melee Unit, typically along the lines of what you'd get for a Fodder-slayer. Equip an Archer with an Anti-magic field or an Ultra Ring, and you're Golden. Angels and their mythics work extremely well for this, but you could always go the human route and go for the rapidfire archer mythic. Jokes Here are a number of strategies that I've seen that...Honestly? Never really amount to much in more competitive play. They can be fun to build, but I've never seen them work very well. Cannons, Catapults, spiky things and Steam Behemoths...They suck. They Just...don't do enough damage, or have enough DEF, to keep up with even an army constructed of mostly uncommon units and equipment. With the introduction of Tesla Staff, The Steam Behemoth dies even harder than it did before. It has weaknesses to both Electricity and Explosive weapons, both of which are pretty common. Orcish Squad Buffs: I know, they look tempting, but they...They just suck. You'd be better off spending your 50 points on almost ANYthing else, rather than a Mok Dar's Shield. Even the Mythics for that, like Gordakar's Shield...6 DEF to a Squad...Not even the ARMY, just the Squad. If you invest a solid 300 Points into that, it STILL won't save your orcs from more than a blast or two from an Armageddon Staff or from other wipe weapons. And fodder cleaning weapons will blast through them as well, it'll just slow your enemy down a bit. "Boss" monsters in armies that don't have Mythics...Look. You think that 76 DEF Orc on a Mechanical Beast looks really intimidating with his Pyro Sword and his Mirror Shield, but your enemy's Rangers are laughing. Unless they don't have more than cheap Muskets and Vermin, in which case... Category:Guide